wannabeBelle
Well-Known Member
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News Park attendance showing significant softness heading into the Fall 2018
- Thread starter wdwmagic
- Start date
There’s bigger areas of concern. I imagine that’s where the sudden panic mentality came from. The recent cuts (of which a lot are ongoing) and raises were a reaction to those, not just recent attendance.
Lensman
Well-Known Member
I don't suppose you could hint at those bigger areas of concern? Or have we already discussed them? As in:
1. Softness in the lead-up to SW:GE.
2. Reduced numbers in advance bookings at resorts.
3. Reduced bookings of foreign packages.
4. Other?
geekza
Well-Known Member
Mickey caught Minnie and Donald "swabbing the deck." It was ugly and Mickey has threatened to walk if Donald isn't fired. There were tears and a shouting match. Ugly.
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
If you’re referring to long term forecasting...then I agree.
Lost in this thread is that daily/monthly numbers don’t matter much...
It’s the mid to longterm sales numbers that matter. That’s why they can “ease off” cuts for slight improvements. Longview
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disneyflush
Well-Known Member
Agreed.
Its also pretty remarkable to me that a business this size has the ability to shift prices on such wide array of things so quickly (assuming there are multiple layers of management approval and statistical support that need to happen) and then coordinate the changes to signage, menus, and anything else affected in such a short period of time. Kind of a logistics miracle if it truly wasn't planned that far in advance. Disney can plan and take action very quickly with the right motivation.
geekza
Well-Known Member
That motivation being to save or make more money.
eliza61nyc
Well-Known Member
But it does beg the question, if attendance is down by 30% and someone told me its been down since 2016 why is everyone saying its packed
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
Everyone isn’t telling you that...
Some are...some aren’t...
Some are commenting on more systemic problems...like what fastpass+ has done to the inventory/experience and what shaving off normal operation hours to sell upsell “experiences” does to everyone.
Different strokes, Willis
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
For me I think the early to mid 2000's were ideal
It was “ideal” when they ceased to follow their 50 year pattern of consistent reinvestment and prices began to be increased often and at whim??
...Oh do tell
eliza61nyc
Well-Known Member
Check. My understanding from just reading, was the overriding feeling was the parks were packed and there were no longer any slow periods.
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
Just officially for me:
The parks are not packed...they can actually accommodate millions more per year easily.
What the difference is that the attraction list - due to lack of investment combined with numbers growth since roughly 2002 - does not improve the experience and caused hefty price increases resulting in monetizing the fringes.
But that isn’t “packed”
winstongator
Well-Known Member
Attendance was up early in the year (Jan-Feb), has been down in the summer through September. Will be interesting to see 2018 annual report numbers on attendance. This is comparing 2018 to 2017.
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
Those numbers are not independent...they are crafted for PR...
So I bet that attendance will be flat or “slightly increase” with “significant increase in per guest spending”
eliza61nyc
Well-Known Member
Wow, lol I don't follow things like that as closely but this is interesting because on the thread about soda prices some one just told me that attendance has been down every quarter since 2016 .
Go figure. I went in August and it was empty (which I was slap happy about) but then I was told its always light late August?
eliza61nyc
Well-Known Member
But don't numbers have to be somewhat verifiable?? I mean I'm thinking outside of Politicians can a company say it got 20 million visitors and not have the paid receipts to back it up.
MrHorse
Active Member
I wouldn't put too much weight on individual crowd reports.
Also though, crowding isn't really about how many people are in the park. It's more a measure of convenience vs annoyance. To a great extent, people gauge the crowd level based on how long they are waiting for attractions and such. If rides are down or running at lower capacity, that puts more people on the pavement and makes lines longer. If something like Food & Wine is going on, people hang out on the pathways instead of shops and lines. If some restaurants are closed or not staffed to seat all tables, others get busier and wait times go up.
You can make a park twice as 'crowded' just by taking a bunch of amenities offline. By the same token, if all the rides have 5-minute waits and all the eateries can seat you immediately, the park will almost never feel crowded. After all, does it even matter how many people are in the park if they're not getting in each other's way?
Calmdownnow
Well-Known Member
Well, a simple solution could be that the walkways are packed and the standby queues are long because Disney is not operating rides at full capacity or maintaining rides efficiently to limit breakdowns -- all in an attempt to minimise operating costs.
MrHorse
Active Member
You can't knowingly lie to the SEC or investors. At the same time, there aren't specific laws and regulations about how you count guests or report other numbers that are unique to your business. Practically speaking, as long as you aren't lying about the dollar values, you can get as creative as you want with the rest of it. (Within the bounds of reason.)
Hypothetically, 100 guests could buy park hopper tickets and each visit all 4 parks in a single day. There is nothing stopping Disney from simply saying 'There were 100 guests at each park today.' Sure, they know how many actual tickets were sold. Sure, they can probably track a good portion of those guests via their magic bands. But, they're not required to divulge that detail. Likewise, they could simply report that there were '100 visits to park X today'. They may or may not choose to report that 40 of those gate clicks were guests leaving and returning later in the day.